Rejuvenation

Released

Recorded at the brand new Sea-Saint Studios in New Orleans, the fifth album from influential New Orleans funk outfit The Meters features a crisp, clean, dry, close-up, intimate production sound, with a band at the absolute top of their game, and features probably the best songwriting of their career. Their take on Bill Withers’ “Just Kissed My Baby” is an exercise in musical restraint that expertly uses the space between the musical parts to generate the groove. They dip into a more traditional soul/R’n’B sound in numbers like “Love Is For Me” and “Loving You Is On My Mind,” and then perfectly meld these two aesthetics on jams like the swinging, FM-radio friendly “What ‘cha Say.” Halfway through side two they drop “It Aint No Use” with its lengthy instrumental interplay sections, a live recording of a troupe of funk-experts locked into each other and just churning it out. Essential swamp funk classic.

Harold Heath